


Everyone Arrives in Hell Naked

by ckret2



Series: Alastor Week [1]
Category: Hazbin Hotel (Web Series)
Genre: Crack, Exactly What It Says on the Tin, Gen, Humor, Implied/Referenced Character Death, One Shot Collection
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-04
Updated: 2020-08-04
Packaged: 2021-03-06 08:13:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,342
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25700110
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ckret2/pseuds/ckret2
Summary: The title's self-explanatory.Each chapter will feature the thoroughly undignified arrival of a different character.
Series: Alastor Week [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1863841
Comments: 11
Kudos: 129





	Everyone Arrives in Hell Naked

**Author's Note:**

> It's [ALASTOR WEEK!](https://twitter.com/SchwiftyChicka/status/1275649386781999107?s=20) Coming right on the heels (... right on the tail?) of Pentious Week but I don't care I'm READY TO GO. Today's Day 1: "First day in hell/Radio broadcast". I went with first day in hell but I'd kinda like to do both prompts for as many days as I can. You know, just to make life extra difficult on myself.
> 
> On top of that, I've been wanting to write little ficlets of several characters' first days in hell for a while, so this was the perfect opportunity to get Alastor's done! _Technically_ I already wrote Sir Pent's too, but I need to polish and edit it a bit before crossposting it into this fic. Right now, I'm just gonna write/post Alastor's.

A mostly-human shape plummeted out of the sky, back first, nearly upside down—a not infrequent sight in Hell, where the newly dead were always arriving.

For the humanoid figure falling, though, it was a pretty weird new experience.

He crashed through the fabric of a circus tent and landed in a crumpled heap among several half-unpacked luggage trunks. For a moment, he was too stunned to move; then, with a rush of terror, flung both arms protectively over his forehead and tried to roll over; then banged his shin against one of the luggage trunks and let out a pained curse and what in the goddamn was up with his voice?

Alastor cracked open his eyes to peer between his arms, rolled on his back to stare up at the torn tent and red sky, and for a confused moment wondered if he's been moved to a medical tent and that night was falling despite the mounting baffling evidence to the contrary. In his defense, he'd always been given to understand that arrival in the afterlife would come with more gates. Possibly, but not necessarily, of either the pearly variety or else helpfully labeled "Abandon All Hope" et cetera. And in either case, accompanied by a welcome wagon consisting of ancestors ready and eager to judge the ever-living daylights out of his life choices.

Instead, he was alone. That was as harsh a judgment as they came in, wasn't it? But then these past few years he hadn't been a very communicative descendant, either.

He tried to sit up, which was the first he discovered that he was completely and utterly naked. The next discovery was the fur-thick cherry red body hair he had seemingly sprouted out of nowhere—along the center of his chest, from his bellybutton to halfway down his inner thighs, below his knees... He had to tug on it to confirm that it was, in fact, real.

And then he noticed the hooves.

"Good lord," he murmured, staring—and was immediately distracted from the hooves back to his voice. He sounded like his voice was coming out of a radio. He pressed his hand to his throat, then his mouth, searching for some machine, but couldn't find one. He _did_ find fangs, though. "Hello? Testing, one, two..." Still there. Was that what he sounded like over the radio? It was awful—ah, but he wasn't using his broadcasting voice. He switched to his learned accent, trying again: "Testing, one, two, three—Good morning, listeners! The time is now precisely..." Alastor squinted at the blurry hole in the tent again, "... late evening. You're listening to... uh... me. Your Pal Al! First voice you hear in the morning and last voice you heart at night, your guide to music and entertainment in New... This isn't my voice, I don't sound like this."

He puzzled over this conundrum for a second, trying to work out the discrepancy. The sound of dead air static hissing in and out of his mouth made it hard to think. He held his breath for a couple of seconds. "Oh! Right, of course—I've never heard my own voice on the radio before, have I? Ha. I'd be broadcasting any time my voice was on air. Obviously. Wow." He considered that a few more seconds, then repeated, "Wow."

He'd been _shot_.

He _had_ been, hadn't he? That wasn't a dream. He felt his forehead but found no sign of the wound—his hooves! His fangs! His body hair!

His _power_.

He had power. He could feel it. Power he had only felt echoes of in life, like a radio receiver playing a broadcast from a station hundreds of miles away—but now he was the source, he was the radio tower broadcasting the signal. Just like he'd been promised. It worked—all those little bargains he'd made in life, and here in death they'd paid off. He had some princes to go pay off. He hated having debts, but he was a smart borrower; he'd have them settled in no time.

Power. Power unknown, power that Alastor had no idea how to harness yet. And now alone with nobody else he could ask about it. But it started with intention, didn't it? Intention and instinct. What he _felt_ was that he could create something out of nothing—form raw matter out of the aether. Oh, what a rush, the mere thought of it! Could he start with clothing?

He held out a hand and tried to create a pair of underwear.

He created a microphone.

He stared at the microphone.

On the one hand, it was a cutting edge model and it was bright red. On the other hand, it was attached to a long cane with no base which meant it couldn't be used at a desk and it couldn't be used as a stand, which was a major inconvenience; and, more importantly, it did not resemble underwear in the slightest.

Alastor lifted his free hand and tried again to create some underwear.

The microphone cane poofed from one hand to the other.

"What a one-trick pony I am," Alastor lamented. He glanced at his new hooves. "Or maybe a one-trick buck?" He chuckled ruefully.

Well, beggars and choosers and all that. He held the microphone in front of his crotch and looked around for some kind of curtain or tablecloth.

A muffled voice near his crotch called, "What's the big idea?!"

Alastor fumbled the cane and barely managed to catch it, held it out at arm's length, stared in bewilderment at his crotch, and then stared at the microphone. It had sprouted an eyeball that was glaring angrily at Alastor. 

"Come on, buddy," the microphone groused. "I don't wanna see that any more than you do!"

Alastor gaped at the microphone. "I—I do apologize! I had no idea that..." He wheezed. "That you..."

He sagged down on one of the luggage trunks, a hand over his face, laughing hysterically.

What sounded like a dozen voices laughed along.

Alastor gasped—it sounded like the buzz of air that came from an amateur breathing too hard too near a microphone—and whipped around, looking for the source of the voices. "Hello?" he called. "Who's there?" He gave the microphone a skeptical look.

"They're not with _me_ ," the microphone protested.

Another voice, far too distant to be the laughers, called back, "Hello?"

Alastor awkwardly crossed his legs and positioned his arms to hide his groin just in time for someone to push his way through a tent flap—and then they stared at each other. It was a tiny red... person-thing. With horns. And a long thin tail. Like a demon—Alastor has seen illustrations of demons—it _had_ to be a demon, didn't it?

"Well, _fuck_." The demon rolled his eyes in deep aggravation and groaned, "What are you doing? You're not supposed to be back here! What are you, some kind of nudist pervert, or..." His glowing eyes fixed on the hole in the tent. "A new arrival," he sighed in finality. "Well... shit. I hate new arrivals."

"If it makes you feel better," Alastor said wryly, "I'm not too thrilled to be here either." There was that laughter again. Where was it?

The tiny horned demon seemed as spooked by it as Alastor, whipping around to search for the sound; then turning back to Alastor to nervously ask, "Then why are you smiling? New arrivals never smile."

Why _was_ he smiling? Of course—he always smiled when he was broadcasting. It helped him sound friendlier, he thought. Helped him get the accent right.

He decided to bluff. If he'd managed to intimidate a demon of some sort just by smiling, then that was an advantage worth pressing. "Because I know something you don't."

The demon shrank back nervously. "Uhhh, right. Sure you do, pal—"

"Starting with," Alastor cut in, "the fact that you, my new friend, are about to have a very, _very_ bad day... unless you help me find some clothes."

**Author's Note:**

> I'm a fan of the theory that the circus tent we see Alastor menacing in Vaggie's Radio Demon flashback is the one Blitzo used to work at, which is why Blitzo had to go find a new line of work. So, if that theory turns out to be correct, the imp Alastor runs into here is totally Blitzo. If the theory is wrong... it's someone else.
> 
> Post for this fic available on [tumblr](https://ckret2.tumblr.com/post/625481140877312000/everyone-arrives-in-hell-naked) [twitter](https://twitter.com/ckret2/status/1290462920149794822?s=20). If you enjoyed the fic, comments/reblogs there are highly appreciated (as are comments here)!


End file.
